Bachelor
2026/2027
Construction Grammar Approaches to Syntax
Type:
Compulsory course (Fundamental and Computational Linguistics)
Delivered by:
School of Linguistics
Where:
Faculty of Humanities
When:
4 year, 1 module
Open to:
students of all HSE University campuses
Language:
English
ECTS credits:
4
Contact hours:
28
Course Syllabus
Abstract
The course covers structural approaches to modelling syntax. The main attention is paid to the analysis of syntactic problems faced by formal syntactic theories and their solutions within the framework of the main structural frameworks: Cognitive Construction Grammar, Radical Construction Grammar, Sign-Based Construction Grammar and Fluid Construction Grammar. Also, in line with constructional approaches, some psycholinguistic and sociolinguistic aspects of syntax are discussed.
Learning Objectives
- Upon completion of this course, students should know the theoretical foundations of exising constructional approaches and the formal architecture of their frameworks; have an understanding of the range of syntactic phenomena these approaches are applied to and the solutions they offer; be able to: identify the challenges that a given language poses for syntactic analysis, successfully apply the constructional frameworks for solving these problems based on natural language examples; be proficient in scientific methods of analyzing linguistic data; have an understanding of the psycholinguistic and sociolinguistic aspects of natural language syntax. The core concepts of this course can be applied in the future when studying and doing own research in the domains of syntactic theory and typology.
Expected Learning Outcomes
- A student is able to compare and contrast the design of different constructional frameworks
- A student is able to chose a suitable constructional framework for analyzing argument structure and to apply the chosen framework to solve argument-structure-related syntactic problems in a given language
- A student is able to chose a suitable constructional framework for analyzing the ordering of subject and auxiliary and to apply the chosen framework to model the syntax or auxiliaries in a given language
- A student is able to chose a suitable constructional framework for analyzing word order and to apply the chosen framework to solve word-order-related syntactic problems in V2 languages
- In addition, the student is able to operationalize the interaction of word order and information structure in V2 languages
- A student is able to chose a suitable constructional framework for analyzing constituency and to apply the chosen framework to solve constituency-related syntactic problems in a given language
- A student is able to chose a suitable constructional framework for identifying morphosyntactic heads of constituents and to apply the chosen framework to solve related syntactic problems in a given language
Course Contents
- Introduction. Construction Grammar and constructional frameworks
- From lexicon to syntax. Argument structure of ditransitives
- Auxiliary-Subject Inversion
- Word order. Verb-second order in German
- Verb-second order in German, continued
- Constituency. Towards a cross-liguistically valid approach
- Syntactic heads. Towards a cross-linguistically valid approach
Assessment Elements
- QuizesМини-тесты по содержанию лекций
- Final testFinal test based on the lectures
- Oral presentation
- In-class participation
Interim Assessment
- 2026/2027 1st module0.2 * In-class participation + 0.3 * Final test + 0.25 * Quizes + 0.25 * Oral presentation
Bibliography
Recommended Core Bibliography
- Русский синтаксис: структурные и неструктурные объяснения: учеб. пособие / Нац. исслед. ун-т «Высшая школа экономики». - 978-5-7598-4216-3 - Летучий А. Б. - 2024 - Москва: ВШЭ - https://ibooks.ru/products/398246 - 398246 - iBOOKS
Recommended Additional Bibliography
- Введение в когнитивную лингвистику : учеб. пособие, Маслова, В. А., 2006